Root
by Inkstain
Summary: Last in 'Four Elements' series. Post s6 Spike arrives in LA to see Angel. Brace yourself.


Title: Root

Author: Inkstain - Doodlefang@yahoo.com

Rating: Pg15, if I could, only they don't have that on this site! PG13 for swearing, and death and blood. Move on itty bitty kiddies - its too much for you.

Disclaimer: None of the familiar characters are mine - borrowed, along with word definitions. (It's Microsoft; I'm being very careful!) The Greshnark demons _are_ mine. Thieves will be driven slowly insane by Mozart's 41st Symphony. 

Feedback: "What do I have to do to get you to shut the hell up?!" - Nothing, hopefully! Please please _please_; it helps me be a better writer.

A/N: This can be read from a possible slashy POV if you so desire; I'm pretty sure it has undertones at some points, though it was not intended! Not that I'm against S/A... -grins-  Also, the idea of whether or not Angel regrets his vampire family is something that I have seen in a fic somewhere before. It is an idea I find fascinating, and not only did I want to explore it from the POV of the Angel _I_ was creating (hope that makes sense), but it fitted exactly with what is at the heart of this fic. So, if you have written that idea before, thankyou for inspiring me, and I hope you don't mind me taking it and moulding it into my own. Feel free to object! 

A/N2: At time of writing, I hadn't yet seen Angel s4, so I just went for non-explained happy things. Connor's back, he and Angel are trying to build a relationship; I don't address how Angel got out of the waterbox. Cordy, too, is back, but now is some kind of orby-demon-seer-higher being woman thing, and Wesley...Well. I was gonna put him in but then I'd have to somehow address how he and Angel sorted things out, and frankly I can't be arsed, because I'm pissed at that whole stupid story arc. So I'm doing a Joss, and ignoring him.

Dedication: To Grey Roses, without whom I would not have had the conviction to go back and work at the Dru fic, and get this series done. Sweetie, you are a writer's _dream_ reader. Thankyou for your encouragement and kind words - to know that at least one person has enjoyed them so makes me smile whenever I think of it. My shrine to you will stand forever.

And thankyou as well to all and any reviewers/readers! Hope the end wraps up the series well for everyone. 

------------------- Root  
  
Settled: (v.) To set right by giving what is due 

(Adj.)In a definite form, unlikely to change, rooted

(Adj.) Firmly established by long standing, entrenched 

---------  
  
So, today started well. 

Finished a case; kissed Cordy before she orbed to another plain to talk to the dead oracles (I'll never get used to that); got a true smile from Connor; watched Fred do a version of the Pylean Dance of Joy about Tacos, making Gunn giggle in a scarily high pitched way; and then subsequently spent the afternoon teasing him about it. 

Guess I should have expected it to go arse up at some point then. Should have expected the shout from Connor, and to look up from the desk and find him launching himself at an unfamiliar, straggly looking vampire leaning heavily against the door frame in the moonlight.

Wait. 

That's Spike. 

Rewind. Press Play. 

Or perhaps it was Fast Forwards because I'm grabbing the beam over the desk, swinging up and over it, then practically flying across the lobby to catch up with my enhanced-ability and senses miracle son - who doesn't even need to see a game face to know that Spike is a vampire - and grasping at the hand he has delved into his pocket before he can pull out a stake and drive it into the heaving chest of the creature he has pressed up against the door with the other. 

"Connor, wait!"

Pause.

I just stopped my son from staking my annoyance. 

Yes, I would be asking myself Why? as well, if I didn't know the answer. 

Why? 

Because there's something wrong with him. 

I can see it in the half closed eyes, the stance, his gaunt form, unwashed smell and dull hair with visible roots. I can _feel_ it in waves coming off him. 

To be honest I should have expected him to turn up. I felt the back of my neck start to tingle hours ago. But as usual I ignored it; I always ignore _these _things. This, however, is not a normal spark I am feeling. Its usually far stronger than this when Spike is in town, enough to give me sufficient warning - which I dismiss anyway, and wait until I actually see him to acknowledge him, because I _don't_ sense _them _anymore. We have. no. connection. 

And yet he always manages to turn up somewhere and surprise me anyway. 

But this is different. I can feel him in the back of my head, and it is stabbing all the way down my spine. This painful feeling has only happened once before; not long after he was turned he got in trouble (unsurprisingly), and he Called on me. On the blood. Our blood.

Denied it afterwards of course. Stupid, proud, stubborn fire Boy. Didn't need my help, he said. Just because I was too overprotective, running in to look after him, stopping him doing this, doing that; never letting him have any fun. 

["When was the last time you unleashed it?]

Oh, he made me want to. He made my blood positively _boil_, sent hot, angry tingles all the way through me from root to tip. Not that it was uncomfortable - I enjoyed his passion. 

But not now. 

There's something wrong with him.

Spike coughs, not to get our attention but because he actually needs to, and we both look back at him again.

_Look_ at him.

He's barely there. He wasn't even this thin when the initiative messed with his head and stole his bite. Ghost pale skin, shoulders and hips and too big jeans. He's all angles and bones and sunken, dull eyes with pain in them.

I could have counted his ribs from across the lobby if I hadn't been shooting across it to help him. Even through the t-shirt. 

There's something wrong with him. 

He shouldn't be coughing. He never coughs. He's never _sick_. I looked after him, I made him; he is here from the essence in my veins and I might have been an evil bastard but my blood was good. Damn good. He's needed to feed from me just five times in his unlife and each time it brought him back from injuries any minion would have died from. Spike has a Master bloodline, he is a Master vampire, and he is _coughing_.

His lungs practically rattle, and it makes my chest tighten painfully for him.

I knew something wasn't right instantly. Connor's fast, but he's not fast enough to look up, recognise someone, and in a millisecond of eye contact realise by his shadowed, empty features that

there's something _wrong_ with him.

My son's face in comparison is full; of shock and confusion. He trusts me, but it is tenuous. 

((What are you doing? _Vampire_!)) is silent, but there. Democratically he merely questions "Dad?.." instead.

And Spike whips his head round so fast my feat of speed is ridiculous in comparison.

He stares up at Connor. 

_Stares_...and recognises.

With a visible flinch, he brings his face back at me in what feels like Slow Motion.

"You have a child..." he whispers. "You get to have a _child_?"

Connor watches him with suspicion.

I glance at the living one, and then the dead. 

Warily, I venture "Yes...".

Trembling, Spike's nostrils flare as he looks once at the floor, then turns and stumbles back down the steps outside.

Connor makes to follow him, then reins himself in with an effort that I know is difficult for him, but he is learning. And it is not unappreciated. He turns to me over his shoulder, demanding, enquiring. I shake my head at him, silence his verbalised question with one hand, and ask him to wait upstairs. 

He looks wounded. And doesn't move.

"He is one of your kin, isn't he?"

Clever boy.

"Yes," I tell him. "But he's different, Connor; he has a computer chip in his head which stops him from hurting people. Otherwise I wouldn't have stopped you staking him."

Yes you would.

Shut up.

"But I...I think there's something wrong with him, he-"

"William the Bloody?"

Holtz makes his time-evading presence known again. 

"You were taught to recognise him?" I get in a question this time.

He nods, but is frowning. "Father never knew him, but he heard of him from Sahjan. William the Bloody; medium height, lean build. Brilliant blue eyes, bright bleached hair, angular face and a scar over one eyebrow. Cocky, passionate, easy to fire up; use that to your advantage..." He speaks as if reading from a book - no. Reciting a passage he has been taught by heart to use in battle. 

"Only; I _didn't_ recognise him." Looking the way Spike went, Connor is puzzled. "He is nothing like he was described..."

"Exactly."

He looks back at me. 

"There's something wrong with him."

My son holds my gaze for a moment more, then acquiesces. "Alright. I will be in my room. You'll ex-"

I pull him into a hug, startling him into silence. "Yes, I'll explain later." Squeezing him briefly, I thank him.

And he half hugs me back. As he disappears silently and quickly upstairs avoiding my eye, I am still for a moment, rooted to the spot by the memory of the unfamiliar, wonderful sensation. 

Then I come back to earth. 

I have to suppress a sigh as I turn to follow Spike outside. Guess its time to face my demons. 

Oh, urgh. I also have to suppress the urge to slap my forehead at the awful pun. He always brings this ridiculous side out in me.

I find him in the garden. He appears to have got no further, leaning uncomfortably against a wall with too-thin back to me. Or is that with his chest pressed slightly to the cool stone? It is a unconscious gesture I recognise from any troubled times in that era of breeches, corsets and one naturally blond vampire, three natural brunettes that I do. not. think. about. 

There's a stone bench right next to him, yet he chooses to stand. Still so stubborn - I can _see_ his legs shivering. Its as if he's just run a mile - it'd have to be twenty usually to tire him out, but in this condition I'm surprised he made it up the four steps to the door. 

He speaks without looking back at me.

"How?"

I pause, leaning back against the railings, and answer truthfully. "We don't know."

"Did Darla come back infused with magic or something?"

I am surprised. Not because he knew that Darla was Connor's mother, nor that he knew she'd died. They might have disliked each other intensely but they were still blood family, and he would have felt it when she left. No, I am surprised because he used her name. 

I don't think he's _ever_ used her name.

Ok, there's something _wrong _with him.

"No. She came back human, and then she was about to die from an illness left over from her first mortal life; she accepted it but...then Dru turned her again." 

Say it out loud like that it almost sounds trivial and simple. An everyday occurrence.

"And then you shagged her."

Right, so the above sentiment about vocalising and trivialising things does not apply here. Spike's words...when you're me, when you have the evil in you that I do, that sort of sentence carries the weight of the world with it. 

"Yes. I sort of...lost it for a while. And she staked herself in order to give birth to Connor...its complicated."

"How is he so..." 

He wants to say tall. I bite back a laugh, then regret it - being this close to him always makes my fangs unconsciously react, and I may not be in full game face but now I have two holes in my lower lip.

The little one. He _hated_ it when Darla or any of us called him that. The baby, the Boy, the child. 

My childe. 

"...old?"

"Got stolen. Hell dimensions - time moves differently."

Most people, not to mention vampires; christ, any demon would react to that. I say it simply, but is not. He, however, just continues. 

"So, Angel the magnificent is blessed with a child. Never mind that he was an evil fuck. Pfft! Forget that he killed hundreds of sons and daughters; it doesn't matter, he's doing his _penance_ now." He snarls. It sounds painful. "Fucking White Hat. You get a kid." He whirls suddenly, fists clenched, pinning me with a burning gaze that is - "You get to have a _kid_!" - jealous.

He is _jealous_.

"That's not FAIR! You never, ever wanted kids. Never."

"B...because I was soul-less..." I begin, but he grabs a potted plant from the floor and hurls it at the wall. 

"NO!" 

Stomping across the crumbled fragments of the stone pot he stops in front of me, and he is just as broken as that vase and I can _feel_ it. 

"I have wanted kids from the exact age of fifteen, when my cousin's baby boy grabbed my index finger and fell asleep with it grasped in his tiny hand. He trusted me, and I would have given him my life for him. Jesus, I practically raised him! Short kid; brown eyes; stupid, messy hair. Wore a ridiculous yellow shirt everywhere, and begged me to walk him to school in the morning because I could whistle every birdsong there was and back then seeing any wildlife through the fog of London was a miracle." A ghost of a smile appears on bloodless lips in remembrance; and then is gone. 

"You killed him, remember?"

Why is he upset about this? He was there. He killed his whole family. He would have killed that boy too if I hadn't wanted a snack before watching my newest childe's first kill, and wandered into a little park while he dithered in the square, deliberating who to eat first.

Oh yes, I remember. Souls tend to put things in perfect, painful clarity.

"I-"

But again he doesn't let me speak. "I wanted kids. I have _always_ wanted kids. That did not simply change because I lost my soul. And yet _you _get one! You! You who didn't care, did things I'll bet you haven't even admitted to yourself yet - but whammo! Now you've got your soul you get to have one." He leans towards my face, grasping at my blue shirt, hissing with hot, fetid breath. "Well hear this, Angel. I have my soul now too, so don't think you're so unique and special. Because you're not. And it. is not. _fair_."

I cannot move.

He has his soul. Was he talking about my son or his soul when he said it was not fair? ...His _soul_. Spike has his soul. 

And I think it's dying.

For a few moments more he stares at me, and I continue to feel the trembles wracking his starved frame through the grip on my shirt. Then he takes a ragged breath and steps away. He trips back up the stairs and into the lobby, and all I can do is follow him with my comically wide gaze.   
  
I may need a moment. 

Wait. Don't be so fucking selfish; _I_ need a moment? I had a moment; I had plenty of them. I took a century to deal with this myself, alone. 

He is different. He has come to me for help, and help I will.

I...I just need a moment...   
  
***

By the time I re-enter the hotel he has gone. Not physically; he is sitting, knees drawn up, on the stupid round seat we use to cover up the pentagram on the floor. But I see by the expression that he has lost his surroundings and disappeared into his own, blood stained head. 

I know this. I did this for so long once that when I 'woke up' the ivy plant on the ruined wall I was sitting against had wrapped itself around my arms as it grew.   
  
Walking over, I keep a distance between us, standing by him but not too near.

"How?" I ask. 

He does nothing. 

I drop to my knees in front of his vacant face and try again. "_How_?"

He flinches, wakes up and, seeing me, gets to his feet, skittering away. He isn't wearing his duster, so he wraps his arms around himself. "Trials. Thought I was getting the chip out at the end - back to my previous state. He...he lied."

Its not much but I can work it out. Ok. Ok, that makes an awful sense. 

"How do you want me to help you?" 

"Don't need your help," he replies. Automatic. Rehearsed. Well practised since fledge-hood. 

But this time it is whispered, and he is staring at a wall with his back to me.

"You want me to make it better? 'Cause I can't. And I wouldn't anyway."

He turns at that. Firey glare. "How old do you think I am, Angel? Four? Just 'cause you've had proper fathering experience now doesn't mean you can baby me. I don't have a booboo for you to fix."

And then he turns away again. This is too confusing; so far some of things he has said are the same as normal, and some are very different. But there is one constant that he has displayed already that I do not believe will ever change, so I give the reply that comes to me because his reaction will, stupidly, bring things in my world back to some familiar, safe order.

"But you are a Boy to me."

"I am not a Boy!" he replies automatically. Rehearsed. Well practised since fledge-hood.

Phew.

"For once would you accept that I have the experience here?"

"Oh yes, once again you're going to show me all you know, try and shape me to be like you. Teach me, oh Master. Give me your endless wisdom." He tries to pace, but on the first step his left knee collapses slightly, and he extinguishes that idea. "I'm not listening to any fucking Brahm, you trumped up git. I don't need your pity, or your advice, or your digging around and sticking your great nose in. I can do this myself. My soul's got a lot tougher since I last had it."

For a moment he sounds so much like normal 'Spike' that I am taken aback again. But just for a moment. 

I finally recognise this voice. It is the heart of William, and Spike; the man, the monster, the fledge, the Master vampire, the human. All and everyone. It is ruled by emotion, through and through.

I used to call him AB. He thought it was a joke, because he fed from anyone, anywhere, with any blood; whereas I picked the fanciest groups, the "best bred".

It wasn't. It was the initials of my name for him. 

Such an Ardent Boy... 

Honestly; the word could have been created just for him. Look it up some time, Will; though I doubt you'll need to, not with all those fancy words memorised in your skull. "Fired with intense feeling, burning, marked by heat"...

The heat bit always seemed so fitting. 

He thinks we never noticed it. I'm sure Dru did; she may have acted like an air-head but she wasn't blind. She had better sight than any of us - _the_ Sight, in fact. So who knows? And Darla...well, you never could quite tell what was going on behind that icy exterior. 

But I did. 

Caught him mumbling about the burning in his chest once, as I waited for him to wake up after he'd got drunk, summoned some Greshnark demons, and got his head bashed in. He'd been ~laughing all the way~ - and wasn't that ironic on a Christmas Eve in Greenland, surrounded by carol singers?

Yeah, I know. What the hell were we doing in Greenland? 

Dru had a thing about Santa Claus. I think she actually believed in him somewhat; perhaps it was because her beloved father had been fat and red faced, with a white beard that _really_ got in the way when I tore his throat out. 

I had hairs in my fangs for days.  
  
She was the one who got us to go. Pouted, which was always difficult to resist. I conceded quickly; but it was mainly because I thought her trying to find something she never could would be funny. 

Plus I've never claimed to not be really fucked when it comes to Father issues. 

Another thing I've never claimed to understand is demons - and I am one! I rooted for them then; I stick my axe in them now. Simplicity works for me.

But not him. Contradictions, opposites, all rolled into one. Dru told me it would happen, told me I would see it one day, would understand. I didn't see _it_, necessarily, because I don't think you can see it all like Dru does without going completely insane. 

No. I saw _him_. 

Take back then. William seemed happy to go as well. Said he liked the cold; which was ridiculous, because the whole time I knew him as a young vampire he always complained and stole all the blankets off the spare beds wherever we stayed. As he said it he was staring into a roaring fire that _he'd_ insisted we light, for feck's sake. We don't need to heat rooms, he just liked it. 

I hear he lives in a crypt now. Guess he's learned to use his own heat to stay warm. And maybe that's why he buried down bedclothes - told himself it was the warmth of the bed, not him. Not him.

But I remember what happened once Dru had skipped out of the room in glee. I remember how he distractedly observed - more to himself than anyone - that 'a grown woman who acted like a child, trying to rediscover a part of lost childhood innocence, was sort of a metaphor for every adults' desire to remain young forever.' Then he added that I'd probably enjoy the twisted humour in it because she _would_ stay young. 

Yep, and it still sounds as over the top now as it did then. He's always maintained ["It's _Spike_ now"]. 

Come on Boy, wake up.

Darla and I looked at him in shock when he'd finished; he hitched a sudden un-needed breath, looked sharply at us as with a eyes that reflected the fire, and mumbled about finding some way to 'put something out' so quietly only I, standing closest, could hear. Then he swore, insulted me again, and left. 

He was silent all the way there on the train, so I knew something was wrong. 

And then came the hell demons, of course. Greshnark. Roughly translated from their language, which is murder on the throat, it means 'Fire eaters.'

Seemed he'd devised a way to organise his cure. 

Though, I think where his alcohol addled brain interpreted the name as them being able to get rid of the emotions in him that he drunkenly described as a ball of fire in his chest; they actually just fed off people's essence. The stronger and hotter the better - hence they _really_ took a liking to him. Kept turning up for the next week or so, even though we were in the snowiest country you could get passage to in the late 1800s.

Like I said; he's an Ardent Boy.

Those repeating encounters ended up with me having to kill them because he was so weakened; except they were smiling with their huge mouths as I did it, getting very full, because he was so pissed that I was fighting his battle for him, and I was a sandstorm of fury because they'd made him look so _dull_. 

He was the next one in my bloodline, in my family tree; and my _childe_ - and they were trying to uproot him from me. 

I was allowed to get pissed. It was my duty, my choice - my decision. Of course, my anger fed him, his fed me; they stuffed themselves and went back happy.

They remembered me when I got sent to hell a century later. 

But I'm digressing, and he's been looking at me to say something for a while now. 

...I don't know what to say.

Well, that's a lie. I do know what to say; what I want to say. I've known it for a long time; I've just ignored it. 

Except things seem different now. I know its going to change my entire existence, but I want to say it. I do. 

So I try it.

"I miss you."

And he punches me.   
  
Reeling from the blow, I am both surprised it hurt and yet not. Even though he's wasting away I've always been astounded at the wiry strength of him.   
  
He is shouting. "You fool! You damn fool! Can't you just get your head far enough out of your arse for one minute to see that we're always in you?! FUCK!"

Testing my jaw I turn back in time to see him sway and fall, dizzily, to the lobby floor, landing heavily on his bum.   
  
He doesn't seem to notice. Just looks down at the floor, and as his shoulders start to shake I realise with horror that he is crying.  
  
"Christ, I don't know how you can possibly miss us 'cause you'll never actually be able to get rid of us. You don't change, do you? So sodding thick headed! And I can't get rid of you either...and it hurts...and I remember... _fuck_ I hate you!" He lifts his head once to stare at me and his gaze is burning so much I can feel it. 

"You know the reason, Angel?"

Yes. I do. But I've told myself I don't.

Say it out loud for me?

"I hate you 'cause I just can't help loving you - and the reason I love you is 'cause I hate you. You're so fucking big - like the whole word comes from you. It was always like that. Screw the Master - _you_ were the root, and we all lived off you, branching off like some twisted family t-tree..." His voice hitches, then is lost into sobs, and he clutches at his face, angles are even more sharply defined than normal from starvation, with trembling hands.

I don't know what to do. Even the awful poetic symbolism does not shake me; it's like looking in a mirror, a true mirror, for the first in a hundred years.   
  
"_Bugger_..." He finally lifts his head, and looks at me with haunted desperation. "Tell me something, Angel. Tell me how to make sense of this."

He wants words. Always _words_. 

Spike forever took words at face value. I'm not saying he isn't introspective, because he is. But Spike uses all these words offhand without really thinking about what they mean, because they fit with what he wants to say. 

["Oh I'm sorry, did I sully your good name? We're _vampires_."]

That word, to him, explained it all. Barely old enough to even be called a fledge and he thought he knew what it meant.

Compare that to his human self, and you can see why Spike seems so different. He's trying to be the complete opposite of William, who went spent so much time trying to pour so much meaning into a few choice, spectacular words that he barely went out and actually tried to _live_ as exquisitely as them.

Oh, yes, I've read his poetry. Just once, on an angrily crumpled page of parchment that I'm sure he had every grand intention of burning, but somehow had kept in his pocket for years.

["My heart expands; 'tis grown ebullient / Inspired by your beauty, effulgent."]

What bollocks.

William was all about ponce, posterity, beauty and living. Spike was trying to get as far away from that as possible; he was tough and dirty and killing and he always got straight to it, no shitting about.

They're both beautiful. They're both part of this base element, this fire in him. Its there in his soul, and when he hasn't got his soul its still there in his veins and eyes and heart and body.

He fancied Cecily, she turned him down; it pissed him off, and he's been screwed by it for a century. You think I didn't see why he went after the Slayers, why it made his eyes light up when I said it the first time? 

Kill them; kill Cecily. 

Only then he goes and falls in love with one - not that I can talk. But that's just how he is; he could hold a grudge for eternity, but is always ready to drop it as well. Opposites again. At base, he's the same, and different; because you can't pin him down with one personality. He's got too many, and they're all him, all rich and fiery and...arden_t_. 

He's ever changing.

I never seem to change.

Ok, so getting my soul was as an earthquake that shook my very world from its foundations. But once the earth stopped moving it was still me. I may not kill humans any more; they've just swapped for demons. I don't destroy innocent life; it would seem I can make it now. Point of note here is Connor. Of course, I made life before, in a way. I made Dru, and Penn, and Spike. I gave them to the Earth. 

I think about them often. Penn...I regret him, now. I regretted him a little then, too; un-souled because he was a boring pain in the ass, and souled I now see the torment that it caused, turning him and helping him to act out his demons for two centuries. 

But Dru...she does nothing to the world except watch it, dance with it, listen to the whispers from the four corners. She unleashed the Judge because she thought it was fun, not to end humanity. In a way, that's the most dangerous thing - ignorance is bliss, they say. But someone always stops her. Point of note _here_; Buffy. The Scoobies. Me. And Spike, even. And she'll pout for a while, but then she moves on to her next game, and very rarely do they grow any bigger than an old past time I remember, of her stomping all the Dandelion flowers she came across. Don't ask me why. 

But you see - she's not exactly a plague of evil, is she? She's confused, and she's lovely, and she kills; but she barely notices. 

And Spike? ...Well. 

Sometimes I wish I hadn't turned Dru, sometimes I don't. Mostly I just wish I hadn't made her crazy, 'cause that would have made everything a darn sight easier - except that was the fun part for Angelus. And Penn was a naive and cruel mistake; but Spike...

Should he have been allowed to die? 

I would have let him. I didn't seriously think Dru would find anyone to turn, and when I found them I was set to uproot her and leave whatever poor idiot she'd grabbed to bleed into the earth and die. Except that then I saw who she'd picked. And I couldn't. 

Rarely when you see the true essence of a creature do you find one you _know_ should not simply cease to exist. There are some humans walking the soil of this land that are too precious, too unique, too annoying and important and fresh and full to simply get old, wither, and die.

So. He changes, and I do not. He likes to point this out. Take calling me thick headed. I almost smiled. 

Familiarity. 

Keeping my eyes on him now I say nothing; instead just drop to my knees next to him, staying close but not touching. He doesn't want that. I simply wait with him until he turns his head, red-rimmed eyes focussing on the wall behind me, tear tracks running down the dirty cheeks. 

"Spike, th--"  
  
He looks sharply in my direction again, but I know what he's seeing; and its not me. It's silver, and metal, and rammed through someone's forehead.  
  
I pause, noting not to use that name for a while, and try again.

"What do you want me to say, Will?"

He lets me use the name. I haven't been able to use it for so long, but he lets me. Shuffles closer, and yet further away.

"Say that you're my Sire. That you're still an egotistical, prissy Irish toff with stupid hair and an annoying habit of being right all the time, and that once upon a time I may not have acted like it, but I...I loved you." He swallows before continuing. 

I may need another moment, because holy _fuck_ I never thought I'd hear that. Souls in the equation or not. 

"And I looked up to you. So...say that you knew? You were everything I wanted to be. Say...say that you knew that." He is pleading. "Say that you loved me. Say that _occasionally_ you think of me. Say that none of this soul crap matters." 

"It does matter." It does, Boy. Oh, it does. "You have a soul now; that's important."

"But I don't _feel_ all that different!"

I start in shock again, as if another thin fist of defiant, indignant truth has hit me. He continues to speak, quietly, but with rising speed like it almost hurts to say it so he's pushing it all out in one stream of consciousness.

"'Cause I still feel like me, underneath, see. No; what used to be underneath is out and right there and me now, so I don't feel like me underneath, I feel like _me_ again, and that thing that covered it up is gone; only..." He swallows and looks away, sickened, then whispers. "...Only I want it back. I'd rather be a killer like I was then feel this. I hate the soul and I love it, and I hate the demon and I love it. Christ, I'm fucking Gollum, Angel!"

He looks back to me, broken but so _brave_, laughing sarcastically. I make a surreal note to ask him when he saw 'Lord of the Rings' (I took Connor to it), but file it away - years of practise mean I can think about pretty much anything when my soul or my heart is breaking. Even when the earth trembles I can follow whims in my head, or be serious and concentrate - because the most emotional, important things in my unlife so far have usually happened when people are trying to kill me, and it comes in useful to think about four things at the same time. For once though, something which is going to have repercussions for everyone is happening modestly on my lobby floor, and the only person who will try to kill me is Cordy in the morning when she sees the mud and god-knows what else he dragged in with him on his boots. 

Those are the rational, boring thoughts. The other one is this: 

I wish I was him. 

He can say it. He can say everything I wanted to when I got my soul, yet instead I spent a century living in shit and eating rats, shying away from everyone because it hurt too much, and pretending to myself. 

I _almost_ said it. I did go back, because I missed them all so much, and I let it show. But I never said out loud that I wanted to be soul-less again. Too much of a coward to face the pain I deserved for my years as The Scourge, and too much of a coward to admit to wanting to get rid of it. 

I know the decision I made to save that baby was the right one. I don't regret doing it. But I do regret missing him kill his first Slayer. Yes, I was there; yes, I saw her blood on his face and yes, I wanted to lick it off. I wanted to share that joyous time with my family. I wanted to be Angelus again. But the one they wanted wasn't there. And he was proud; he wanted to tell Will so. He wanted out of me, and I wanted to find some way to let him because it was so much easier than trying to find a line, an area, where I could love them but hate them too. 

I know this man who looks at me now. It is what is left when you take away all the ponce and posturing of William and Spike, and look underneath it. 

I've only seen it once before. One hundred and twenty eight years before, to be precise. That time I mentioned earlier, when I found Dru busy on the floor of that barn, smelt the blood in the air, leaned my head over her shoulder and _saw_ him. Ironic that once again I see him when we are on a floor. 

At that moment in time he was nothing, and everything, all at once. I'd never - still haven't - seen someone look like that before. 

He was lost, and found. Hiding away but right in your face; hot and cold; dark and light; small, huge, horrified but orgasmic; gasping and weeping and dying and absorbing and laughing and positively _glowing_ with life and death. He stared up at me and his face was as if all his knowledge had flowed out of him already, even though Dru'd only taken half of his blood, yet he still seemed to know everything.

I think for a moment he did.

Darla vaguely enjoyed turning me, mainly because I groped her even as I died, and she got to drink alcohol-riddled blood. But all in all, my turning was shite, for both of us.

His was probably one of the most amazing things I have ever experienced, second only to the first time I saw Connor. It was a profound moment of seeing, truly _seeing_, a person. No, a personality. I will never forget it as long as I walk this earth. 

I can feel myself being drawn to him again; like there's a root between us that is pulling me to place a hand on his shoulder - and moving, I do, saying nothing. His face turns back to me, eyes searching my face. I simply nod. 

He understands what that movement means. But then, he understands me better than I do myself. He understands that what he's said, that what he _is_ now, is everything I know. Everything I wanted to say.

He moves closer. 

I don't think he'll touch me; but he does. Drops his head ever so lightly on my shoulder wearily, touching and yet almost not, so lightly I can barely feel it; and we're both so tense you could plant us in the ground and we'd stand stiff like scarecrows; but its _contact_. 

My nose is humming. 

I know that's a weird description. But it is. You know when you can feel the intensity and spark in the air, when your pores seem to open and let in everything, and it makes your nose tingle with electricity? 

My god-damn nose is _humming_!

I want to twitch it but don't, because I'd look stupid and he's right, I am egotistical. Instead I sigh, then lower my head to speak right into his ear - his hearing always did go funny when he hadn't eaten for a while.

"But I can't tell you that I occasionally think of you."

He stiffens, rips his head from my shoulder and goes to move. But I have anticipated it all, and grasp his arm and face before he can move, holding him to my side. He looks straight at me challengingly. 

So different, and yet so the same...

"I can't tell you that because I _always_ think of you. All of you."

His clenched, stretched jaw relaxes as it drops slightly open.

"And how can I say that I just _loved_ you? Aside from the fact that that puts it into past tense, which its not, how do I put into words how I felt? What it was - and is - like to feel you, and Dru, and Penn and Darla _in_ me?"

I'm glad I've already dropped to my knees, or this would be my cue. They're trembling even now. Not even telling Buffy I loved her the first time made my heart ache this much. And even after her I never would have been able to say "love" so easily if not for the fact that my friends say it, and mean it, and show it to me. I mentally thank my living family once again, then turn back to my undead one. 

"There are no words. I've alway known that you were there. I've always _wanted_ you to be there, souled or no, and that made me feel like shit because you were supposed to be evil, and then I felt even worse because most of me was screaming that that was wrong. Why should I feel bad?"

He is soft eyed, almost in a trance.

"It's the line," he murmurs, and I stop what I was about to 'not-say' -- even speaking those words is not really saying them at all, because you just _can't_ -- and frown.

"There's a line?"

He nods. "Mm. The thin line between love and hate."

I try not to snort; he sees this and closes his eyes briefly, chuckling once humourlessly. "Yeah, cliché poetry. Its what I do best. But; its true." He opens the sky eyes again. "And we're all stuck on it. All of us have got our feet well and truly up to the ankles in it's shit; even Darla; though knowing her she's probably forcin' your un-souled self to hold her up so she doesn't dirty her silk shoes."

I mentally chuckle, and then I realise he is looking at me carefully, saying no more. He is pausing to gauge my response. She is the mother of my son, after all.

"Oh! Right; no, that's fair." 

He's hit the nail on the head again - or, maybe, the other way around, because I always thought of Darla as a hammer, and Spike as that one indignant nail that refused to be driven into place properly, bending and poking out so that you'd snag your sleeve on him and be forced to stop and pay attention to his opinion that it really didn't matter if your coat was ruined now because it was bloody foofy anyway and yes, I think I'm crazy sometimes too. Spending a century with Dru tends to make that part of your brain that comes up with weird imagery stay active - and you can blame her for that one because she's the one that came up with the hammer thing in the first place. 

Whereas Spike becomes an open book thanks to copious amounts of alcohol and little mental prodding, I discovered she gets chatty if you don't let her sleep for a week and a half. Add Spike, kicking the obscure metaphor section into overdrive, and it's a party. 

He grins a little. "She really, really would be, wouldn't she?"

He almost sounds _fond_. I can only shrug (slightly agog because once again he's knocked me for six) while he coughs again to say more, and he's got a little more confidence as his voice on the next lines is stronger. 

"Anyway, no matter. She's still there. And see, with you, that line is so firmly knotted around and between us lot, and you, that you never could shake the need to know and see how we are. And I always felt it, but didn't care, only I have your problem now too, and now its starting to make me feel like shit that I'm connected to you all. Like you just said, or didn't say really...ah, bollocks to it, you know what I mean."

"You wonder why should we feel bad, _apologise_, for a bond?"

He nods again. "_Yeah_. We can't stop it, we didn't choose it; well, I didn't choose you, at least. Why does it make me feel so crap that I'm getting tempted to ignore it like you do? I felt myself starting to, so before I fell into it completely I knew I had to come and tell you all the reasons I know its wrong, before I convince myself otherwise."  
  
I simply let him speak; his words seem to fill me with new life.

"Before I find a way to ignore the humming in my veins and the tingle in my old neck scar."

I…I am unfurling shoots to turn towards the burning sun that is him  - I want this, I want the truthful light that he is giving off. 

"I have a soul. It hurts. I remember too many things; all cut and shiny like glass, or crystal, or fucking diamonds or something because I haven't got the strength to break them - I _can't_ break them, and I think they're gonna break me. But it means that I...I don't mind telling you now. I think...no, I know, I prefer you this way. I prefer you to the soulless prick; not least because you won't shatter all the bones in my hand if I flip you the bird."

I blink. This is about all I can manage at the moment.  
  
He _accepts_ me this way...

And he's babbling. 

That is the most startling thing. It's sickeningly, horribly fascinating. I've never heard him babble, or stumble over words, though by all (now long dead) Londoners' accounts, he used to. 

"But I don't know if anyone'll prefer _me_ this way."

Oh, Will.

"And you say I'm thick headed..."

He scrunches his face up at me. "Beg pardon?"

"You're not any different! All this time I've been talking to you, it been like talking to the same person you've always been! You even swear as much."

"So? You don't have your little lilt anymore."

I grimace. "Well, that dropped out of my speech because I didn't talk to anyone for nearly a hundred years. And I was glad to let it change; it reminded me too much of my mother, and sister, and father, and cousins and Uncles and Aunts and neighbours and -"

I swallow. 

"Lets just leave it at Galway. Or, maybe Ireland."

He nods in agreement, looking sick, and even paler than normal.

"Will, somehow I can't see you shutting up for a century. And I highly doubt you'll ever quit swearing; but it doesn't matter either way. I think...I think this man, vampire - no, _creature_, that you are now is the fire that you're so desperate to get rid of. You say the burning is your soul, its William; that there were emotions you never got rid of that tied you to your old mortal life, and they always made your chest spark."

He starts, and looks at me with naked shock and vulnerability on his too thin face. "_How did you_...?"

"I'm very observant. Plus you say a lot when you're rat-arsed and passed out."

"The Greshnark demons..." he murmurs in recognition. "Christ."

I continue. "And you think that now your soul is back that the burning sensation is it, even worse. Its not."

Now he looks confused. He doesn't like being confused. He'll get pissy now.

"Not William? What the fuck else is it then, Sherlock?"

See?

Ignoring the habitual defensive language, I correct him. "I didn't say it wasn't William. I think it is; and yet not. Not entirely. Its your humanity, your personality. You can't give it a definitive name or label, assign it to one aspect of you - it's just there. And unlike me; you never lost it entirely. All you've got back with the returning of your soul is your conscience. Your humanity was always there, but your demon blocked your guilt."

For a moment, he is silent. 

Then: "Huh..."

I was wrong about there not being words to convey certain deeply rooted, ultimately life changing emotions and realisations. "Huh" is a very good one. 

"So how did you work all this out?" he asks, and I just look at him.

"I'm your Sire." Sounds simple, again. Its not. "I know you."

He shakes his head with a half snort. "You _were_ my Sire," he corrects, looking away and shakily getting up; I jump to my feet and grab him again.

"No. I _am_ your Sire." I tell him; then back off a little. Idiot. I've always been too possessive; but now I see something within my grasp again I've wanted for a century. "I mean..." I swallow. 

Just say it. 

"I'd like to try being your Sire again." 

His head whips round, and within a second of the words leaving my lips his body is shaking. 

"You wanted to hear the words, so there they are. Said. Or, Not-said, but we've already decided fuck that."

His eyes are wide, his hands shaking, and I see in his expression that if I am messing with him he _will_ kill me. 

I'm not. Tonight he has burrowed under the fence I had around my heart and soul and shovelled out all the rotting compost on the way. His act of bravery, of courage that I could not muster, has shaken my foundations once again and this time I will change. I'm about to say one of the most important things in my life. 

"I _knew_. I was always proud. You brought spark to everything, and you worked your way not only right up my nose, but into my very being."

He is crying again. I might be too; maybe that's why I can only croak the last bit. "_My Boy_..."

That's too much for him; quietly his knees buckle and then he's not fighting to stand anymore because he's half collapsed against me again, wet face pushed into my neck, and I stupidly hug him. That part of brain that overworks itself realises I've got enough ammo here to tease him about for ages, but then it also notices that my fingers round his back are resting in the sharp grooves of a spinal column I should _not_ be able to feel, and once the painful jolt in my stomach has passed I begin to guide him to the fridge.

"Food," I tell him, tugging the door open and ripping into one of the two bags that I was supposed to eat this evening. I don't care that its mine, and he won't care that its cold; he needs food badly, and I'm going to get it to him. I'm going to look after him. Because he was right about everything. 

...Except, evidently, how quickly to feed. "Will, slow down!" 

I wrench the packet away from him, and he lets me take it reluctantly. He's not stupid; he knows if he gulps he'll just throw it up again, but I know what its like to be so hungry the overwhelming taste pushes it from your mind. 

A moment; he steps back a little, resting one hand on the desk while he swallows properly and pauses long enough to let it actually clear his throat. Then he takes the packet back and drains it more slowly, albeit still as messily. Then after carefully licking it off his chin, taking the time to clean himself up, he looks up at me and casually drops the empty packet on the floor. 

I resist the urge to sigh; not in annoyance but somewhat giddy (and ridiculous) glee at the little tingle that familiar lazy motion brings. 

Spike turns, putting the other hand on the desk behind him and leans heavily back against it while the blood settles a little, glancing at me sideways.

"I...can I stay for a couple of weeks?" He speaks for the first time in a while, surprisingly shyly. Still surprising me after all this time.

"Yes," I reply; but we both know it'll be for much longer. "You can help out."

He snorts, a mixture of sardonic wit, and genuine, light hearted amusement.

Will _and_ Spike. 

I rejoice. Liam and Angelus don't agree on anything, but I'm glad that he has that. 

"I'm not taking any orders. I'll be a pile of ashes before I obey you-"

"And you nearly have been too many times for our scarred fingers to count," I add, handing him the last packet - I took him not losing the last one when he snorted as a good sign. He takes it gratefully, and I observe that the edge of his hunger is taken off enough for him to actually grimace at its coldness this time.

Before he eats it, however, he pauses. "I...I know I've always bitched at you, Angel, and I really _really_ do hate you, but...thanks."

I just nod; for once, he doesn't want words. 

Leaning back against the desk by his side I have a sense of completion and peace, and vague (though not wholly unexpected) worry that he's going to drive me crazy. I try to ignore the part of my head that is desperately jumping up and down and attempting to point out this out, because it'll ruin the moment. This is going to be difficult to explain to everyone, especially Connor, but I believe they will accept him. He is my family as much as they are. 

As he eats, a last tear that he still hasn't wiped away from earlier drops off his jaw, hitting my hand next to his on the desk. 

The blood he is eating is cold, and there's no heating on in this room, but his tear is _warm_.

Such an Ardent Boy.  
  
END


End file.
